Meet the Mind Petals Columnist
I remember the first day that I told myself that I wanted to become an internet entrepreneur: it was Jan 1 2004 I was 20 years-old. Since that cold winter day, I never looked back and entrepreneurship has become a part of my life in so many ways. Most of you already know my story, but here’s a great interview that gets pretty deep into my life as a young entrepreneur.
Now 22 years-old, recently graduated from college with a degree in English, and living with a few college buddies on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, I wakeup every morning and think about new ways on how I can help other entrepreneurs just like myself. I know that it isn’t easy being an entrepreneur and that is exactly why I created Mind Petals: to create a community of young entrepreneurs who can support one another with insights, advice, and experiences from our own lives while we build our businesses.
I’ll never pretend to have all the answers, because I simply don’t. In fact, I’m in the same boat as many other young entrepreneurs: living day by day trying to improve my situation and make my mark in life. I don’t run a thriving business that makes big bucks. I pay the bills by picking up web-related jobs whenever I can. Sure, I have a lot of ideas up my sleeve and would like to implement them, but for now, my priorities are as follows: 1.) Help as many people as I can whether it’s the young entrepreneur on Mind Petals to the homeless person on the street 2.) Make enough money to pay my rent every month by picking up gigs here and there and 3.) Continuing to work on my many other ideas to implement when I have the time and finances to do so – I can’t do everything at once.
My days usually consist of 2- 4 hours of writing and responding to emails, usually other entrepreneurs in need of assistance or advice. A few hours trying to seek web development gigs from various potential clients (this is tough). Some consulting here and there when I’m lucky enough to find someone in need of my advice and willing to pay for it. And, of course, at least a good 5+ hours spent on my (our) baby: Mind Petals.
Whether it’s helping to spread the word of our network, finding new members, or coming up with new and interesting content for the network, Mind Petals is more than a project to me, it’s a vehicle to help the world of young entrepreneurs by sparking minds and enlightening the masses on how they can become entrepreneurs and eventually change the world.
MP Daily News >>
Mind Petals Daily News is a column where I speak to the world of young entrepreneurs about various issues that simply aren’t being spoken about. Things such as running a business while still in school, having parents who don’t support your decision to become an entrepreneur, and how to surround yourself with positive people who can help you grow your business.
You’ll never know what to expect with the Daily News because that’s exactly how I want it – I love the spontaneity of speaking about various issues that can help young entrepreneurs see things a different way and say: “ That’s a great way of looking at it… this can help me out big-time.”
It’s my mission to help as many entrepreneurs – as many people – as I can. Sure, just like you, I want to make the big bucks, have the booming business, and change the world. But I’ll never forget to lend a helping hand to someone in need.
I started my first business in 2001 at the age of 22 (though work started nearly a year earlier). At the time, my decision to take on the hardscrabble challenges of entrepreneurialism stemmed from mere pragmatism. Since then I have discovered that no other life suits me nearly so well the life I make for myself.
Though my first business failed, forcing my to return to more traditional employment for a few years, I found myself irresistibly drawn back into one project after another, until finally the opportunity to start my current business presented itself.
Today I am the Director of 501(c)(3) educational not-for-profit corporation operating on the island of Roatan off the Caribbean coast of Honduras. My company, Steel Pan Alley, provides tuition free musical education to the underprivileged local children and teenagers.
Our service does more than broaden the children’s cultural exposure and provides a much-needed extra-curricular activity to these under-engaged children; the skills we teach also build toward gainful employment in the tourist-dominated island economy.
I hope readers enjoy my “Start Up”-focused column on Mind Petals. As the title implies, I attempt to discuss and elaborate upon the broad stokes and rudimentary concepts of starting a new business. Eschewing advanced details and narrow specifics, I strive to make each column immediately comprehensible and helpful to the greenest of entrepreneurial greenhorns. Look to “Start Ups” for my insights on first steps—the trials, tribulations, and bare-bones basics of small business actualization.
Startup Column >>
- Monday’s Missteps: True stories about my own mistakes, the better to aid you in avoiding them
- Tuesday’s Tools: Highlighting the resources you can use to increase your start-ups’ chances of success
- Wednesday’s Wisdom: Taking a step back to consider the philosophy of entrepreneurialism
- Thursday’s Triumphs: True stories about my own successes, the better to aid you in reproducing them
- Friday’s Fiction: A serializes story about new entrepreneur’s journey into business ownership.
When people ask me what I do for a living I usually like to tell them that I’m a writer. I think it sounds romantic. And, for the most part that’s true. I write many things and get paid for some of them. I earned my degree in Creative Writing, and so I guess I’ve also earned the title.
I consider myself an entrepreneur because I can see the bigger picture, and have turned my writing skills into a profitable business. I am completely in love with what I do. So I’ve decided to take it further than simply “writing.” I freelance editorials and restaurant reviews for a number of publications including Metromix of the Chicago Tribune, and also do commercial copy writing for clients. I write fiction and non-fiction and have about 10 projects going at a time. I must have it that way.
My most recent business venture is yellow Magazine (theyellowzine.com). I created it with my fellow writers in mind. Our core is a group of excellent writers whose voices need to be heard. I’ve been edited many times before and it has thickened my skin. But there’s this great satisfaction in seeing your work printed un-spoiled by the editor’s pen. That’s what I give my writers. I never edit for voice or content. If the story is great we publish it. So our audience gets a really fresh taste with each new story they read.
Helping others gives me this warm toasty feeling inside that almost makes me feel guilty. I’ve volunteered in my home communities for years and have been a member of Americorps – which was probably the most rewarding experience I’ve ever had. So, I suppose I help people because I need to. It’s a bit of a calling. I want to help other entrepreneurs because I’m in their shoes. I can relate to the ups and downs and I know that it can only get better.
Life Column >>
Writing the Life column is really great for me. I talk about it all the time like it’s this big important thing. And I really feel that it is. I think it’s great that entrepreneurs are able to come together in an organized fashion and share advice and experience. I’m breaking into the life category with some pretty general thoughts. I’m setting the pace and the background for future topics.
Since life happens to me every single day, and I deal with business every single day – I would really like to move into personalizing the column a bit more. I work from home and juggle a very energetic 2 yr. old, housework, dinner making, check writing, and clients, partners, employees. I know what its like to NEED to make something out of your dreams and to do it with no money in the bank.
My family is the most important part of my life and I WOULD give up all of this for them. I’m 27 and married with a son, and I come from a long line of loud loving stereotypical Italian-American hand-talkers. I love people, music, food and thrift stores.
Angela Gilltrap is a 27 year old entrepreneur. She is the author of three books, has created two television series’ and continues to produce concepts, ideas and formats for corporations worldwide. Originally from Sydney, Australia she now reside in Manhattan and has previously worked internationally in Tokyo, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, London, Paris, New Caledonia, New Zealand and the US. For more information you can check out her website at angelagilltrap.com
Marketing Column >>
I always try and give practical marketing advice from a variety of industries. Many times I will focus on entertainment which is the industry I am in however, even if I never hit on your particular industry I do find entertainment has so many great examples regardless, these can easily be put to use in any section of business.
William Quisenberry is 24 years old and currently resides in his hometown of Lexington, KY. William graduated high school in 2000 and attended the University of Kentucky following graduation where he majored in Kinesiology and Pre-Physical Therapy.
Having no pre-exposure to business William planned to receive an undergraduate degree and go on to Physical Therapy school despite never having a true love and joy for the field. However William’s whole life changed when he applied for and received a Sales and Leasing Consultant position with a local automotive dealership one summer while out of school, it was here that he discovered his true calling for business, sales, and ultimately entrepreneurship.
Since his successful sales career in the automotive sales industry William has also worked in multiple inside and business to business sales atmospheres which include mortgage services, oil and gas developmental capital raising projects, and also marketing/public relations.
Now by age 24 William has been blessed to create a consulting firm named Net Empire Consulting where he works with consumers and commercial institutions to help arrange financing services for a variety of products such as equipment financing, asset-based lending, medical practice finance, pre-settlement funding, law firm financing, residential mortgage financing, and commercial real estate. Net Empire also aims to establish independent contracting sales and marketing networks with many U.S. firms.
He is also the Co-Founder and Partner of a commercial janitorial and field services business named Crystal Klear Cleaning & Contracting Professionals (”C.K.C.”). William also enjoys writing projects and has created a freelance writing and copywriting firm named N.E.R. Professional Development. Besides looking for new opportunities to pursue William also is finishing up his B.S.B.A. in Finance and is entering the M.B.A. program this summer. Also William plans to pursue an alternate Masters degree simultaneously with his M.B.A. in Dispute Resolution (M.S.D.R.).
After graduation William wants to enter the Private Banking & Wealth Management field or better yet possibly even the fiercely competitive field of Investment Banking. After gaining pertinent experience and connections in the financial services industry, William has a long-term goal of eventually creating his own large financial institution and becoming one of Wall Street’s “Market Movers.”
Innovation Column >>
William joined Mind Petals to help give advice to other young aspiring entrepreneurs and also to receive ideas from some of the countries best and brightest young business professionals. William is also extremely passionate about reaching ALL individuals despite ethnic, racial, or economic backgrounds. Having come from his own humble beginnings, William wants to prove to youth that they can make their dreams a reality and they don’t have to be the kids of multi-millionaires to do it.
Want to join us?
We’re always looking for entrepreneurs to join our ‘Preneur Petal team. We currently have the following columns open:
- Boostrapping
- We’re Talkin’
- Modus Operandi
If you’re an entrepreneur with great lessons, insights, experiences to share, and most importantly: the urge to help others succeed in life, then let us know and we’ll talk further.
And as always, if you run a business/entrepreneur focused site/blog, and think it would make a great addition to the network, then let us know.
Thank YOU
Without you, the entrepreneurs making things happen and not just talking, there would be no Mind Petals. Our collective drive, passion, and ambitions to change the world are what fuels this community. We are brothers and sisters connected by entrepreneurship; a family of freethinkers that is destined to make big things happen and disrupt the status-quo by all means necessary.
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